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July 13, 2009
7 Tips For Starting Your New SEO Business
7 Tips For Starting Your New SEO Business
By John Alexander
One of the subjects our workshop attendees always seem to enjoy
is training on how to set up your own SEO business from scratch.
We spend time teaching them about ways they can build their new
clients by focusing on making those clients successful. One of
the things any new SEO needs to remember is the importance of
not just taking on new contracts, but ensuring that each of their
new contracts is well aligned for success. When building your brand
new business, ultimately what you are striving to build is your
"reputation for getting people great results". This usually
results in more referral business each time you help some company
increase their visibility, attract the ideal target audiences or
help improve the client's Web site conversion factor (turning
visitors into buyers).
Without a doubt there are a variety of ways you can build your
new SEO business quickly, so lets just touch on a few simple
pointers.
i) Customers need GENUINE results.
Make this an early part of your training and develop skills that
will address at least the following two areas (which are a must
for success).
a) Build your SEO skills to where you can bring top visibility
to the client's ideal target audience.
b) Learn how to write copy that compels the visitor to "respond."
A number 1 rank even for the right keyword phrase will not
truly benefit your client unless you also know how to compell
that initial response.
Attracting the ideal target audience within the top search results
only has value, ONCE the visitor takes action. It is a combination
of these 2 elements that truly is the beginning of your client's
online business. One without the other, is of no true value but
together they bring success.
ii) Be selective about who you take on as a client.
It's easy to sell SEO but you need to keep your focus on those
businesses that convert to success easily. Examine the markets
through behavioral and keyword research and determine that each
prospect you take on has a strong chance for success BEFORE you
agree to take them on.
For example, you may want to avoid taking on a client who wants
to sell some common product that can be bought on any street
corner or that appears to have no proven market online. You want
to assist customers who, through your due diligence and
advanced behavioral research you can already identify that their
marketplace exists online for sure. You see it because you do some
research first, before taking them on as a client.
Being selective about who you take on as a client means that you
are choosing your prospects based on their potential for success
and not just because they want to hire you!
iii) Learn how to separate your service from the competition.
Sure you perform search engine marketing, but so do many other
firms. Separating yourself based on the fact that you do possess
the skills to get genuine results is pretty big in itself. This
may separate you from a load of others who "talk the SEO talk"
but don't really know how to deliver. Remember, the reason the
client hires you in the first place is usually because they need
someone they can trust. So how else can you separate yourself
from the local competition? What other value will you provide,
that most others do not. The answers here are wide ranging if you
put on your lateral thinking cap.
These don't have to be complex solutions but they should deliver
some genuine value. They also need to be included in your skill
set so as you think of ways to add value to your service, make
sure you have build the skills required to deliver. I could
probably give you about 2 dozen ideas right off the top of my
head but these need to be service offerings that are right for
you. Would you be willing to offer services to give client's
exposure into major news feeds? How about a service where you
monitor the client's competition? Some folks are fascinated
with the competition and love this idea. How about helping the
client with things like exposure in industry specific e-zines?
Helping them get more business out of their current customers?
How about services to offer them professionally written press
releases? How about offering them a quarterly watchdog service
to identify the hottest new search trends for new products they
could be marketing?
If none of these sound exciting you, there are dozens of other
ideas you could explore and remember, these are also all profit
centers where you can make some income.
If you like these ideas and want more, consider coming to one of
our live SEO Mastery Workshops sometime...we'll get you into the
lateral thinking mode and show you how to make your new SEO
business profitable in one of our brainstorming group sessions
iv). Learn how to communicate the value of your services to the
client.
Give it some thought, do a little brainstorming and you will find
there are lots of ways you can help your client truly realize
the value of what you do. From how you explore their marketplace
to come up with original custom strategies to how you help them
understand SEO as a process rather than some mystical, mysterious,
black art which we all know it is not. How you help your client
realize and benchmark their progress is essential and the secret
is all in how you communicate.
v). Once you have a comfort level with the client, why not
join in the fun. For the right market, you might help
the client grow in exchange for a share in the profits.
If your skills are medium to above average, why not share in the
profits yourself. I am referring to offering someone a vertical
contract. This would be a deal where you own part of the company
in return for making it successful with your SEO skills. Don't
brush this off. There are some exceptional deals to be had if you
start thinking laterally. Also explore the possibility of teaching
the client about effective affiliate marketing.
Vi) Practice customer service excellence.
It's not just about handling your client's technical challenges.
One of the biggest loopholes in the Internet marketing and SEO
business, is lack of "quality customer service."
Do you return their calls? Do you look after their questions
promptly? Do you keep them apprised about the newest trends?
vii) Manage Your Client's Expectations well.
Success Principle: Teach your client's the truth and learn to
manage your client's expectations. If you deliver above average
results and communicate well, you will have a client for a
lifetime. There is nothing quite so powerful for building client
loyalty as offering a legitimate SEO service.
In Conclusion:
The single most important focus to keep in mind when starting
your new SEO business is that of making every single customer
a true success story.
The result of doing this has the impact of building your reputation
very quickly. Word of mouth is very quick where true "success stories"
are concerned and each merchant or client you help, will ultimately
contribute to building you a great reputation and will usually
always result in additional referral business.
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3. Grab a Free SEO Tip of the Day
Here is a tip for some of the newer readers I've been speaking to
recently. One of the single most important aspects of gaining your
SEO comfort level is to exercise your skills by reason of use
(or practice.)
The easiest way to do this is to create a few of your own high
quality informational sites and you can make money at the same time
with affiliate marketing. I want to encourage you in this direction
because it will set you free in terms of proving to yourself that
you CAN do it. The sooner the better.
Too often you have the new SEO student focused on selling (before
they know for a fact) that they can make a huge impact with their
skills. Everything in good protocol and logical order order.
Do what you need to to prove to yourself you can do the job and
then you'll be ready to offer consultation or take on clients.
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4. Check for a local Community SEO Workshop in a community near you
Visit this page to see future upcoming SEO skills dates in various
communities across North America and in Asia:
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5. Over 80 Free SEO Articles Recently Posted here
--Have You Considered A Career in SEO Copy Writing
By John Alexander
--The Art of Distraction Marketing - the Next Shiny Stone
By Guest Writer - Paul Ineson
--Building Your New SEO Business - Secrets of a Circumspect SEO
By John Alexander
--6 Easy Ways to Make Your Web site Whisper Reassurance
By Robin Nobles
--SEO, Latent Semantic Indexing and Natural Language Processing
By Michael Marshall
http://www.searchengineworkshops.com/articles.html
I hope you enjoyed this week's newsletter and if you know of
a friend or family member that might benefit from it, please feel
free to pass it along to them.
Perhaps we'll see you next week in Orlando. Our next
complete SEO Mastery Workshop will be September 21-25 in Las Vegas
Registration Info:
I wish you all the very best of continued success.
Highest regards,
John Alexander
http://www.SearchEngineWorkshop.com
http://www.SearchEngineAcademy.com
http://www.SEW-WRC.com
Posted by John at July 13, 2009 01:50 PM